Formula 1 News: Norris tops only practice session for 2025 Sao Paulo GP

#4 McLaren driver Lando Norris (pictured) turned a lap of 1m09.975s to top the only practice session for the 2025 Sao Paulo GP at Interlagos.

–by Mark Cipolloni–

During the early running, drivers concentrated on long run pace on the hard Pirelli tires and it was not until late in the session that drivers switched to the medium Pirelli tires for their Sprint Race qualifying sim runs.

Norris was just 0.023s faster than his McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri in the 2nd superior McLaren. Everyone else was out to lunch.

Nico Hulkenberg was third for Sauber, a massive 0.619s behind Norris.

Fernando Alonso was 4th for Aston Martin, 0.631s behind Norris.

Hometown favorite Gabriel Bortoleto rounded out the top-5 in the 2nd Sauber, 0.641s behind Norris.

There is a big gap to he rest right now, but with the caveat that Verstappen, Hamilton and Leclerc did not set a flying lap on either the mediums or the softs, choosing to save tires for when it counts.

Verstappen had a clear first sector, but gave up the lap in the middle. He did pick up some traffic, but not enough to justify aborting – he instead pits and bolts the hards back on.

Interesting, he will be going into Sprint Qualifying with no flying laps under his belt.

The Mercedes duo bolted on the mediums quite early, and do not look to have shown their full hand here yet either.

A big spin for Hamilton late on in the session brought out some yellow flags, replays showing he bottomed out, lost downforce, and managed to do a full 720 there.

Norris set a 1m 09.975s in the end there, around a second slower than last year’s Sprint pole. But there is nothing in it between the two McLaren drivers and Norris leads Piastri by just a single point in the championship.

Next up is Sprint Race qualifying.

2025 Sao Paulo GP Practice Results